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David Cameron pledged to make the House of Lords more representative of British politicsCredit:
AFP

There is nothing new in criticism of the honours system. For all the wonderful titles, many resonant of our greatest empire days, the suspicion that cronyism matters more than achievement has been ever-present.

Within my lifetime, it is a close call whether Harold Wilson’s resignation honours, the so-called Lavender List, looked worse than David Cameron’s last summer. The difference between the two is that a House of Lords stripped of most of its hereditary peers has meant that modern-day Prime Ministers have had even greater powers of patronage.

With so many vacancies created by the culling of those peers, it is perhaps understandable that Tony Blair created 374 new members. What is more astonishing...